Twin River casino in R.I. expected to draw new crowd of gamblers now that it has table games

Monday

Jun 17, 2013 at 11:06 PM

The people sitting at the blackjack tables Monday at Twin River were the first in a new pool of gamblers the Lincoln venue expects to draw into its revenue stream with the start of a full casino operation.Twin...

Paul Grimaldi Journal Staff Writer paulegrimaldi

The people sitting at the blackjack tables Monday at Twin River were the first in a new pool of gamblers the Lincoln venue expects to draw into its revenue stream with the start of a full casino operation.

Twin River’s owners pushed successfully in 2012 to add roulette, craps, blackjack and other table games to its thousands of video lottery terminals at a time of increasing competition in the U.S. casino industry.

Massachusetts in 2011 approved licensing of three casinos and one slots parlor as the Bay State seeks to capture some of the $1 billion its residents gamble away elsewhere.

New casinos or slots parlors opened in Maryland, Kansas, Maine, New York and Ohio in 2012 as gross gambling revenue at commercial operations rose 4.8 percent to $37.3 billion, according to the American Gaming Association. Gross revenues rose in 15 of the 22 states that had commercial operations in 2011. (Ohio in 2012 became the 23rd state to permit commercial casinos.)

The spread of casino gambling across the United States has hurt some traditional gambling locales. New Jersey, home of Atlantic City and its 12 casinos, hit its high point in 2005 when its casinos saw more than $5.9 billion in combined gaming revenue. Revenue has dropped steadily since then, falling to $3 billion in 2012.

Increasing competition also has hurt the two tribal-run casinos in Connecticut, Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods Resort Casino. Neither has seen a year-over-year increase in monthly slot revenue since December 2011. It’s been several years since either one has put together monthly increases in revenue.

Some of that competition comes from Rhode Island, where investors transformed Lincoln Greyhound Park into the Twin River casino. As the Lincoln gambling hall evolved, Rhode Island and Massachusetts residents alike saw less reason to travel to the woods of eastern Connecticut to gamble.

With 66 table games now, Twin River is likely to attract more gamblers from Massachusetts and Rhode Island — at least until the Massachusetts venues open.

Adding table games means drawing not just more gamblers, but different types than now enter the casino off Route 146.

The easiest way to understand it: More women play slots, more men play table games.

A 2008 study by a research team from the University of San Francisco and the University of Nevada-Las Vegas showed more women tend to play bingo while more men tend to play blackjack. In addition to the gender difference, there is an age divide, the study showed, as people age 36 to 50 were most attracted to slots while people age 21 to 35 were most likely to play blackjack.

A Twin River consultant, Steven Rittvo of The Innovation Group of Companies, agreed that table games and video slot machines draw different types of gamblers.

Gambling is a social activity, Rittvo noted in a 2011 interview with The Providence Journal. So that means more mixed-gender groups.

Rather than shifting money from the video slot terminals to the table games, there could be a small rise in slot revenue as new gamblers try their luck at that game.

“You have the ability to capture these people because you don’t have that [table] offering at all,” Rittvo said at that time.

The introduction of casino gambling in Massachusetts, perhaps starting with a slots parlor opening as early as 2014, will reshuffle attendance and revenue throughout New England.

Rhode Island’s two gambling houses — Twin River and Newport Grand — generated $527.3 million in net revenues in the budget year that ended June 30, 2012.

About $320.6 million of that went to the state — $288.8 million from Twin River and $31.8 million from Newport Grand — making gambling the third-largest source of state revenue.

The net gain to the state over the next year from Twin River’s new table games is projected to be $6.5 million, after the state pays $4.3 million in new Lottery and state police expenses.

A consultant hired by Governor Chafee to study the regional gambling landscape said Rhode Island’s gambling revenue will rise for about three years before dropping significantly — by perhaps $100 million annually — once casinos open in Massachusetts.

As casino gambling spread across the United States in the last decade, most gambling operations have become “convenience” locations rather than destinations unto themselves like Las Vegas.

Convenience casinos akin to Twin River draw gamblers mostly from within a short drive of their location, according to Rittvo, up to 75 miles. That means most people drive to such casinos, gamble a few hours, maybe grab a bit to eat, and leave. Most of those people spend less than half a day at such places.

For Twin River, envision a large “D” atop a map of Southern New England, with Twin River in the middle and the vertical spine at Hartford. Few people west of Connecticut’s capital city venture past the Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casinos to gamble at Twin River.

About half of Twin River’s gamblers come from the eastern portion of Massachusetts, bowing out toward Boston.

Much of the attendance growth at Twin River since its expansion in 2007 has been fueled by Massachusetts residents. The number of visitors from Massachusetts increased by 154 percent from 2006 to 2012, according to the Fourth Biennial New England Gaming Behavior Survey, released Monday by the UMass-Dartmouth Center for Policy Analysis.

Center researchers estimated that 580,000 New Englanders visited Twin River in 2012. Of those, 385,000 were from Massachusetts. Rhode Islanders accounted for 162,000 visitors, the second-highest total.

“Thus, one might argue that the success of Twin River, despite being located in Rhode Island, is more dependent on Bay State residents than Ocean Staters,” the survey states.

The addition of table games is likely to increase visits from Bay Staters as Twin River intercepts some gamblers who otherwise would travel to Connecticut’s two tribal-run casinos.

The 66 table games are expected to boost Twin River’s revenue into 2017 before a slots parlor and three casinos are fully operational in the Bay State.